A day trip from the car by the normal route. A week of bad weather left the mountain very snowy. It took me a bit over 4 hours to go up and down from the Innsbrucker Hut. The fresh snow and occasional showers of rain and snow made the going slow and a bit tricky. Impressive mountain, I'd like to come back for more routes.

my steepest ice climb. Thanks to Klaus who lead the difficult pitches. It was an "old-style-trip". Sleeping in the hay at the Mischbachalm pasture was very special. Weather wasn't fine, so I have no good pictures

We left the valley floor and climbed easily and slowly up to the "hut" thinking that we would summit the Habicht the next morning (as most people do) but as it was only three o'clock, we pushed up to the summit and though it was late, the fact that it was the longest day of the year made an afternoon/evening summit bid an acceptable option. We climbed very slowly due to the fact that my partner was on his first climb ever! Shortly below the summit, we split up and I scrambled over the final ridge to the summit (cables make it "safe" but the route is tougher than most people describe it and can give one the feeling of vertigo if you are not used to big vertical drop-offs). We scrambled back down the ridge, across the "glacier", down the NE face, across to the steep ridge, down the main rock climbing portion (class I when dry) and over the rocks back to the hut in time for Käsepressknödel (a cheese dumpling). Our schedule looked something like this - From the car to the hut (slowly walking) took 2:40, from the hut to the summit took 3:00 and it took 2:40 to get back down to the hut (by which the Austrians seem to mean wonderful mountain hotel). Our times are slow but safe and anyone can repeat them or even go much faster. NOAH

* note - The 21st of June is the Solstice and the Tyrolians climb to their mountain passes and light fires to celebrate. Wonderfully pagan and unlike anything I have seen before!